by Chant, Zoe
“This is Shadow,” said Shane.
Cloud stretched out her neck, curious but not aggressive. Merlin opened his hands and let the two kittens sniff each other. Though their wings were different, their fur was very much alike. They flew off together, up toward the rigging. Halfway up, they were joined by a fluffy black kitten with wings like a Monarch butterfly. As the three kittens began to circle and playfully chase each other in the air, they were joined by Batcat and Spike.
“Is the butterfly kitten yours too?” Dali asked Shane.
“Nope,” said a woman cheerfully, walking up to them. She was short and curvy, with brown skin and black hair. “She’s mine. Well, more mine. Shane’s my mate, so we kind of share all the cats.”
“You have more?” Dali asked, craning her neck to spot them.
“Rogue, Natasha, and Jessica Jones. But they’re back at home. They’re not magical, and they don’t like to travel.” The curvy woman stuck out her hand. “Hi! I’m Catalina Mendez. I’m a bodyguard and a leopard shifter.”
Shane smiled at her fondly. “And a superhero.”
“I was experimented on by Apex, the black ops agency that the wizard-scientists took over,” Catalina explained. Gleefully, she said, “So I have powers!”
Dali was interested to see that Catalina, like Merlin, talked about being experimented on with a total lack of angst, unlike everyone else in that situation. But before Dali could ask about it, Catalina threw her arms around Merlin.
“Merlin, I’m so happy for you,” Catalina said. “You finally got a flying kitten of your very own! Isn’t it great having a furry little darling to perch on your shoulder and chew on your hair?”
Merlin chuckled. “It is, but she’s not exactly mine. At least, she’s only mine the way Shadow is yours. She’s really Dali’s pet, though she does perch on my shoulder sometimes.”
“Oh no.” Catalina’s face fell. “But I’m sure some day...”
Merlin whistled. Blue, who had been napping on a pile of sawdust, woke up with a startled grunt, then galloped to Merlin’s side, his wings buzzing madly as if they’d give him extra momentum. Proudly, Merlin said, “This is my magical pet. His name’s Blue.”
Dali had already taken a liking to Catalina, but it only increased when Catalina said with utter sincerity, “Oh, what a good dragonfly doggo!”
“He’s a bugbear,” said Merlin. He dropped to his knees, and Blue made a sincere effort to climb on to his shoulder and perch.
“I love him!” said Catalina, petting him. “Oh, good for you, Merlin. You got the best of both worlds.”
“Both worlds?” said Shane. “Perching on shoulders and getting drooled on?”
“Cat world and dog world. And bonus bear world.” Catalina grabbed Shane’s arm. “Come on, let’s have some fun!”
The two of them ran to the ladder, which they climbed with feline grace, then joined the group that was taking turns swinging on the trapezes.
Merlin caught her hand and introduced her to Ethan, a Protection, Inc. bodyguard with sandy hair and blue-green eyes like Hal’s mate Ellie; in fact, he explained, they were twins. His own mate was the beautiful and very pregnant Destiny, also a bodyguard.
“Though not right now,” Destiny said cheerfully. “I’ll be back soon-ish, though. All us parents and parents-to-be made the rest of the gang promise to pitch in with the babysitting.”
A tiny snow-white kitten with robin’s egg blue wings swooped down briefly to bat at her earrings, then returned to the kitten games above.
Grace came back then, with Kalpana in tow.
“Come on, Dali,” Grace urged. “Kalpana’s going to show me her stage manager’s booth. Managerial geek girls unite!”
Dali couldn’t resist. Waving good-bye to Merlin, Destiny, and Ethan, she headed for the booth with the two women, where they had a very satisfying time examining the equipment and telling stories about disasters onstage and onboard caused by people failing to do as they were told. They exchanged emails and phone numbers, and promised to stay in touch.
Things change in an instant, Dali thought again. She’d not only gotten her old friends back, but made new ones.
When she returned to the party, she found that she wasn’t the only one who’d made new friends. Tirzah was in a huddle over a laptop with an elegant blonde woman who introduced herself as Fiona, one of the Protection, Inc. bodyguards. Dali said hello, then left them to their way-over-her-head tech talk.
Merlin caught up with her as she passed by Hal and Roland, deep in conversation over the rewards and difficulties of being the boss of a bunch of rowdy shifters. She told him her thoughts on new friends, and he grinned and replied, “I was just thinking the same thing. Come look at this set of new pals.”
He indicated a gawky young man who couldn’t be more than twenty-one, and had pulled up a chair to join Grandma, Janet, and Pete’s mother Lola.
“Who’s he?” whispered Dali. “Some local shifter?”
“His name’s Manuel, and he’s semi-local,” Merlin replied. “He’s a protégé of Nick’s, going to college in New York.”
The three white-haired women seemed utterly charmed by Manuel’s earnest manner as he asked Janet’s advice on putting on a production of a musical he’d written. It was, he explained, called Howl and was an exploration of the real lives of werewolves, written by a werewolf.
“It’s got serious themes, but I want it to be fun, too,” said Manuel.
“Like Hamilton,” said Lola. “My Caro just loves that musical. Can’t stop playing it.”
“Isn’t that the rap musical?” Janet asked doubtfully.
“Oh, it’s not all rap,” said Lola. “Lots of it is very hummable. I could play you some on my cell phone.”
“Manuel, do you have any songs on your phone we could listen to?” Grandma asked. “I mean from Howl.”
“No, I haven’t recorded any of it yet.” Hesitantly, he said, “I could sing you something, though...”
“Yes, please,” said Grandma.
“We won’t be critical,” Janet assured him. “We know it’s a work in progress.”
“Come on,” Lola said. “I want to be able to say I heard it before it was even recorded!”
Manuel cleared his throat a few times, then began to sing in a pleasant tenor. The song was a heartfelt tribute to the joys and responsibilities of being in a pack, with clever rhymes and wordplay.
Nick, the young man with green eyes and tattoos, came up beside Dali and Merlin to listen, along with a woman with flowing silver hair. She too had tattoos that wound up one arm in an abstract pattern, but hers glittered silver. Dali had never seen anything like them before, and had to stop herself from staring.
When Manuel finished, everyone broke into applause. He ducked his head, embarrassed, then caught sight of Nick and said, “Applaud Nick. If it wasn’t for him, I’d still be stealing cars in a werewolf gang.”
“No fucking—” Nick began. Three pairs of disapproving eyes turned on him, and he gulped and said, “No way. He was always meant for better things.”
The silver-haired woman offered Dali a hand. “Hello. I’m Raluca, Nick’s mate.”
As they shook, Nick said, “And the best fu—best fashion designer on the west coast. You want a special outfit? Call Raluca, she’ll fix you up.”
Raluca was indeed dressed very beautifully, but Dali’s attention wasn’t on her clothes. It was on the miniature blue dragon that fluttered down from the rigging to land on Nick’s shoulder. It gave an inquiring chirp, then a trill as it stretched out its long neck to nuzzle Raluca’s cheek.
“Wow,” Dali breathed out. “A dragon!”
“A dragonette,” said Merlin. “Rescued from guess where.”
Raluca said, “Her name is Doina.”
“She’s the dragon,” Nick said, indicating Raluca.
Dali remembered Merlin’s first aid kit, with its little vial of the antidote for a poison that only affected dragons. Raluca was one of the people Merl
in was looking out for, along with his team and the circus and anyone else who he encountered. Dali was his one-and-only, but he had more than enough kindness and protective instincts to go around.
An elegantly dressed man with golden hair strolled up, arm in arm with a redheaded woman bedecked in jewelry, with a diamond dragonette perched on her arm. They introduced themselves as Lucas and his mate Journey. Their dragonette, Treasure, flew off with Doina.
Dali gazed up at the dragonettes and kittens swooping and diving in mid-air. She murmured, “It’s so magical. It’s hard to believe that it’s real.”
“I know what you mean,” said Journey warmly. “Lucas and I have been together for years now, and sometimes I’m still just struck by amazement at how my life turned out.”
Merlin put his arm around Dali’s waist, strong and secure and warm. “Me too.”
As the party went on, the two teams drifted together again. The west coast team started teasing the east coast over their impromptu performances.
“I can’t believe I missed it,” Rafa said. “Pete as a dancing bear! Now that’s a once-in-a-lifetime spectacle.”
“Yes, it was,” said Pete. “And now it’s over. Thank God.”
“Not quite,” sang out Caro. She waved a phone at the group. “Guess who enlisted a buddy to come to the show and secretly tape all the best bits?”
Pete made a grab for his daughter’s phone, but she ducked under his arm, laughing.
“Get it, Tirzah!” Pete called.
“Get it yourself,” Tirzah said, snickering. “I for one am delighted that my brilliant performance was immortalized on tape.”
“And Batcat’s, too,” said Dali. “Well—maybe. I don’t know if the magical pets show up on video.”
“They do if you already know they exist,” Caro assured her. “I got Batcat. And Dad riding a unicycle. And Carter covered in oil.”
“That video must be destroyed,” said Carter.
“I totally agree,” said Pete.
They looked at their other team members. Carter demanded, “Aren’t you going to help?”
“I’d love to see it,” said Merlin. “I missed a lot of it, since I was busy wrongly accusing Fausto—” Cupping his hands around his mouth, he called up to the air, “Sorry, Fausto!” In a normal speaking voice, he went on. “And other stuff.”
“I don’t mind if anyone sees me being a strong man,” said Roland. “It’s not as if I was oiled.”
“I wouldn’t mind seeing myself juggling,” said Ransom, rather wistfully.
Pete and Carter glanced at each other, then spontaneously worked together, creating a pincer formation to go for the phone.
“Help!” yelled Caro between bursts of giggles. “Help, I’m under attack!”
Shane seemed to materialize out of nowhere, neatly confiscating the phone out from under Carter’s nose. “Got it. Hmm. Too bad we don’t have a projector, so we can all see...”
“Give me that,” said Dali.
Shane passed her the phone, evading Pete’s grab for it. Dali tossed it over Carter’s head to Grace, who caught it and yelled, “Kalpana! Help me in the booth with the projector! Rafa! I need a blockade!”
Grace and Kalpana ran for the ladder to the stage manager’s booth, Grace stuffing the phone into her Hello Zombie Kitty purse for safekeeping as she went. Rafa body-blocked Pete’s rush after them. Carter tried to dart around him, and Rafa shouted, “Guys! I need a little help here!”
Merlin and everyone on the west coast team who wasn’t either pregnant or holding a baby fell into place, forming a shield wall and blocking Carter and Pete’s access to the ladder.
Grace and Kalpana reached the booth, where a microphone had been left on; a chorus of amplified triumphant giggles floated down. A moment later, a video clip began to play on the ring’s backdrop, showing the world’s most disgruntled dancing cave bear.
Pete sat down on the floor and groaned. Carter joined him when the clip of his oiled chest outlined by flying squirrel throwing knives appeared. Caro’s friend hadn’t recorded the entire performance, but they’d gotten all the most embarrassing parts.
When Caro herself appeared, gracefully flying through the air on the full-size Moonbow, her Grandma Lola called out, “Just beautiful, princesa.”
Pete got up and put his arm around Caro’s shoulders. “We’ll keep a copy of that one. But the ones of me must be deleted.”
“No way,” said Tirzah. “I’m saving copies deep on the dark web, where you’ll never, ever find them.”
“Email them to me,” said Grandma Lola.
Pete sighed.
When the clips ended, the groups again drifted apart. Blue wandered off to play with Fiona and Justin’s three-headed Cerberus pup, Trio, and Ethan’s frost-puppy Snowy. Catalina and Shane went to try out the flying trapeze.
Dali looked up wistfully.
“Want to try?” Merlin asked.
Dali held up her left hand. “Not unless you want a repeat of how I scared the living daylights out of Morgana’s minion.”
He laughed, then said seriously, “I could hold your wrists instead of your hands. Like this.” He demonstrated, gripping her wrists. “Now you grab mine. See? Like that.”
His grip was strong, and she’d seen him fly through the air with ease. But more than that, she trusted him. He’d never suggest that she do anything unsafe, and if he thought she could do it with his help, she could.
She took his hand. “Let’s go flying.”
A few minutes later, Dali was soaring through the air, delighting in the sense of speed and freedom, while Merlin held her wrists and softly sang a snatch of “The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze.” His golden hair floated around his face, his sky-blue eyes sparkled, and his ease and grace and strength were on full display.
High above the crowd, it was as if they existed in their own perfect little world. It wasn’t frightening—she could never be afraid while Merlin held her—but it was thrilling, exhilarating, and altogether wonderful.
“You’re especially sexy in mid-air,” Merlin said softly.
“You too,” said Dali. “Let’s find a closet or something when we get down.”
“Good idea.”
They didn’t find a closet, so they snuck out of the big top and went hunting around the empty fairgrounds, clutching hands and giggling like a pair of teenagers. Merlin turned a corner around a food stall and burst out laughing.
Dali, following, also began to laugh when she spotted what he was looking at.
It was a clown car.
The wheels were off, and it seemed to be in the process of being broken down for parts. But it was unmistakably a clown car.
“Well,” she said. “The windows are painted over, so it’s definitely private.”
“Come on,” Merlin said. “Just to say we did it in a clown car.”
“I can’t resist such a romantic invitation,” Dali said, and climbed inside.
It was small enough inside that they couldn’t move without touching one another. Getting fully undressed would have been difficult, and she doubted they’d have had the patience to do so even if they’d had all the space in the world. The hunger in Merlin’s eyes was a blue blaze, and Dali felt hot enough to set the air on fire. They pushed aside the clothes that were in the way, their fingers clumsy with need, and he slid into her like a key into a lock.
They moved together, rocking rather than thrusting, overcome with passion. Two bodies and hearts and souls united in love and ecstasy. A spark built within her, setting her every nerve alight, until it roared into a wildfire and they both went up in flames.
Dali had completely forgotten where they were until she emerged from the lazy haze of satisfaction and tried to stretch out, and accidentally elbowed Merlin in the neck.
“Ow!”
He tried to move aside, and that was how she discovered that his hand was pinning her hair.
“Ow!”
They managed to emerge without too much mo
re damage, and fled to the train to clean up in a bathroom.
“Well,” Merlin said, “We can now say that we’ve had sex in a clown car.”
“It was pretty great while we were doing it,” Dali said, brushing out her hair. “But now I know why most people prefer beds.”
When they returned to the party, they passed by a man with copper-colored hair and startling black eyes, who had earlier introduced himself to Dali as Justin, Fiona’s mate. He was speaking quietly to Ransom in a corner. Both men looked so serious that Merlin and Dali glanced at each other, then walked close enough to overhear.
“If you ever want to talk to anyone,” Justin was saying. “I was experimented on by Apex. It leaves a mark.” He indicated his eyes. “Literally, in my case.”
Ransom made a sound halfway between a laugh and a sob. “You think me talking to you will make me feel better?”
Patiently, Justin said, “It doesn’t have to be to me. But yeah, I think you should talk to someone who can understand.”
Ransom closed his eyes briefly, seeming to struggle with himself. When he opened them, they were unfocused, gazing into some far-off distance. “I—I’m sorry. I have to go.”
He turned and hurried away, stumbling and bumping into things as if he was half-blind. Dali and Merlin went after him. Before they could catch up with him, he’d gone backstage. They saw nothing but the door to a storage room closing.
Merlin knocked. “Ransom? Are you okay?”
There was no reply.
CHAPTER 29
Ransom stumbled away, barely registering where he was going. His mind’s eye was focused on a vision of the woman he’d seen after he’d passed out at the warehouse, the woman whose face and story had slipped away with waking like he’d tried to grab a handful of smoke.
He wasn’t going to lose her again.
A door was in front of him. He opened it, went in, and fumbled to lock it behind him, still holding on to the vision with all his strength. Any interruption, and it would be gone.
